"If you don't have a girlfriend, then I…"
"No way!"
Might Guy dropped the rag and practically leapt to his feet. He waved both hands in front of Konome's small face, the hard lines of his features flushing an odd shade of red.
"I would get thrown in jail."
"What are you imagining? I want you to adopt me," Konome said, a black line of exasperation forming in her mind.
"Adopt… me?" Guy froze, eyes going round beneath his heavy brows. He genuinely had not considered that answer.
"You can tell I'm not an ordinary person," Konome said, nudging her cane and the sandy-yellow bundle on the floor with the tip.
Guy nodded. No normal person carried that much cash around. And despite the cloth over her eyes, she moved as if sighted. He still could not tell whether she was truly blind.
"I'm not from Konoha. I came here to become a shinobi. The Ninja Academy doesn't admit outsiders, so I need a village registration."
She laid it out plainly. Seeing Guy's tensed features soften, she continued.
"You adopt me and help me become a Konoha shinobi. I pay you for your trouble. Mutual benefit. How about it?"
"Well…"
Guy hesitated. He had just turned twenty-one, made jōnin a year ago, had no girlfriend, and had never seriously thought about marriage and children. Adopting Konome would not derail anything.
The problem was money. A taijutsu specialist like him mostly took combat commissions. Every time he opened the Eight Gates he ended up covered in injuries. Some missions barely covered his hospital bills at Konoha General, never mind food, clothing, and gear. Nutritional supplements, meat, medicine, worn-through clothes, every line item bled him dry. Only after making jōnin had his mission pay improved. Otherwise he would still be borrowing from Kakashi just to get by.
Konome's proposal was not difficult. In fact, the payment was visibly generous. It was simply very sudden. First meeting, dinner barely done, and now family?
Thump. Thump.
Two bricks of money landed on the floorboards in front of him, the weighty thuds like mallets pounding his sternum and shaking his restraint.
"If you agree, from today on I'll cover everything you eat and wear, your training gear, medicine, ninja tools, all of it."
It was easy to be magnanimous with someone else's money. Especially money she had taken by force.
Konome tucked a strand of silver-gray hair behind her ear, her tone almost swaggering.
"I also have some rare taijutsu liniments and secret compound recipes. They should outperform anything on the market. I'll supply them to you for free."
The Taketori were a taijutsu clan. She truly did know a trove of formulations.
The more she said, the more Guy's expression loosened. At the mention of secret medicines, the training maniac in him practically glowed.
"And I can put you on a monthly stipend as pocket money…"
"Enough!"
Guy chopped her sentence in half with a raised hand, eyes iron-bright, spirit blazing. "Konoha's Blue Beast is at your service."
Water hissed in the sink.
Guy was already setting up a guest room, clearing clutter from the bed. Konome sat on a stool, watching him bustle about with a faint pink curve on her lips.
The fish had bitten the hook.
That afternoon, while she scanned the village streets with her Byakugan, she had found Might Guy drenched in sweat at the training grounds. For someone hunting a patron and a Konoha registry, it was a revelation. Good character, great strength, not the sharpest, and poor. Perfect to a ridiculous degree. And the Eight Gates on top of that.
Steel bones that sneered at damage, fueled by the Gates' surge of chakra, guided by Konome's Muscle Sovereignty that could concentrate every fiber of strength into a single point. She dared not even imagine how terrifying her taijutsu would become.
So she waited on the path he always took home from training. She sat there the entire afternoon.
He did not disappoint. Guy could not leave a blind child curled on a street corner to sleep under the sky. He had already filled in a tragic backstory for her before she even spoke and brought her home. Saved Konome the breath.
Kakashi had been in the tree above her for half the day, pretending to read Icha Icha while keeping watch. He surely was on his way to report to the Third Hokage already.
Sarutobi and Kakashi knew Guy's strength better than anyone. If Konome stayed with Guy, any ill intent she might harbor would be crushed by sheer force. That would put their minds at ease. No need to assign another tail.
Tomorrow she and Guy would finish the adoption paperwork and become family under the law. After that she could freely display her talent and draw investment. So long as she did nothing against Konoha, no one in the open would dare lay a hand on her.
A backer. Legal village status. A taijutsu teacher. A future sparring partner. The secret of the Eight Gates. Plus a housekeeper who cleaned and a cook who made noodles. Pay Guy a salary and every problem she faced on arrival in Konoha vanished at once. She could ignore daily chores and devote herself entirely to the path of power.
Aside from calling someone father on paper, it was perfect.
Knock, knock, knock.
Hearing the noise, Guy turned from the headboard he was dusting.
Konome had already stepped into the room.
"It's not ready yet," Guy said, flustered. "No one's used this room in a long time, so I turned it into storage. If you want to rest, take my room tonight and we'll switch after I finish cleaning."
Konome shook her head. "You're too slow on your own. I'll help."
She bent to pick up a fresh cloth and set to work beside him.
"That's not right. You are my guest."
"It's fine, Guy." She flipped the blackened rag to a clean side and kept scrubbing. "We started on money, but after tomorrow we will be family."
"Family…"
Something shifted in Guy's eyes. Since his father, Might Duy, had passed, he had been alone. The word had grown distant and strange.
A stack of junk toppled with a clatter when Konome's elbow brushed it. A spotless glass frame tumbled, target fixed on her brow. She was still crouched, head down, apparently oblivious.
"Careful!"
Guy lunged to catch it.
A small white hand rose first and plucked the frame cleanly from the air.
"Don't worry, Guy. I have my own way of sensing."
She returned the frame, which held a photo of two figures in green, and casually exposed her sensory ability.
"That is… a very important secret, isn't it?"
"No secret outweighs family."
Guy stared at the photo in his rough fingers, then at the girl who had left those words behind and gone right back to wiping the floor. Her gentle voice overlapped with his father's steady baritone, echoing in his chest.
Family, huh.
Watching the small figure working busily on hands and knees, the loneliness that had been his constant companion seemed to fill with a new, slight silhouette.
Behind him, Konome's hidden eyes studied his faraway look. The corner of her mouth tipped up.
This was why she had to come to Konoha. Canon did not matter. Every flutter of a butterfly's wing could summon a storm, and Konome was no butterfly. Here she knew the pivotal people of the village. As the saying goes, rivers change course more easily than a person changes their nature. Learn the weak points, and you can reach the softest part of any heart.
From there, everything opens.
Compared to gambling on unknowns in other hidden villages, making her way in Konoha would be far, far easier.
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